Pawn Value of Pearls

When there was a steep rise in gold prices in recent months, purchasing of pearls had been down and more importance was given to gold and silver. So I don't think that pearls have any good pawn value.
Pearl

here in the philippines, although pearls can be really expensive here, there really is no significant pawn value. so guess one has to really a pearl lover to purchase such expensive jewelry. gold, diamonds and platinum remain better investments, i think.

Pawn Value of Pearls

I think i may be of some help in this particular subject.
As an ex Pawn Broker of 8 Years i've had many people want to pawn their Pearls, as someone stated earlier " Gold & Silver " are the main lifeline to most shops. Pearls are hard for a Pawn Broker to test. Thus the Pawn value is approximately .10 on the dollar, or 10% value, that's even if they take it in.

The reason this happens is because there is no universal grading scale. Estate jewelers and Pawn Brokers are not pearl experts and often aren't sure how to value the pearls. With diamonds, gold, and silver, they can look it up and give an exact value. This is just not the case with pearls.

I feel this is a huge disservice to the resale of pearls. I can only hope that like diamonds, pearls will soon have a set grading scale and valuation based on this grading scale.

[QUOTE=purepearls]I can only hope that like diamonds, pearls will soon have a set grading scale and valuation based on this grading scale. /QUOTE]

I don't think that's going to happen anytime in the near future. Pawn brokers take in precious metals and gems knowing they can unload them for no less money than the price of scrap on any particular day. Any items they keep past the redemption date are basically saleable. For pearls to be routinely accepted by pawn brokers, there would have to be 1) a scrap pearl buyer ready to take the pearls immediately and 2) a very definitive way to grade them. I think when you consider all the considerations in grading, you'll see there's practically no way to elminate some of the objectivity which goes into grading.

Now on to the "create a need and then fill-it" part of my post. Anyone want to go into the scrap pearl buying business with me?

Pretty Panda pic by nlerner on her U.S. excursion last year, San Diego Zoo.[/SIZE][/SIZE]